Aspiration is Inspiration

[Disclaimer: This could very well be my most directly-from-the-heart piece of writing that I’ve ever been willing to dispense into the great wide somewhere. Take advantage. You may never read anything by me like this again.]

Once upon a time, not long ago at all, my colleague Nick told me a true and terrible story from his own life:

Several years ago, I worked the night shift at a fast food restaurant. It was late and dark outside. Along came this group of people walking through the drive-thru, asking me for free food.

I said, “No, you’ve got to pay for it,” but then they said, “No!”

(WHAT THE HECK, right?)

I tried compromising with them. I said, “Okay, look, if you come in here and help clean all the tables, I’ll let you have some food.” But they refused that, too: “No! Forget about it!” And then they just walked off.

(WHAT THE HECK is so right.)

I felt a sudden and slight surge of sorrow in my soul when Nick finished telling me his story. Sad, because I am not surprised in the least bit that there really are people out there who demand rewards when they aren’t willing at all to work for rewards.

But then, once my brief bout of depression was over, a heartwarming calm swept throughout my being. I got really happy. I realized how profoundly grateful I am that I’m constantly surrounded by family, friends, and associates who are polar opposites of the “drive-thru people” from Nick’s past. I’ve chosen to spend my mortal existence with people who are driven, glad, and enthusiastic about living, and I don’t plan to stop enjoying life with said positive people.

This blog post is for anyone who has ever shared their talent or dream with me by any mode: face-to-face, over-the-phone, electronically, snail mail, whatever. In other words, this is for just about all of you.

I’ve made a list of many of your talents and dreams. Look at how cool you are:

You are becoming wonderful wives, mothers, husbands, and fathers.

You are becoming successfully blooming entrepreneurs.

You are hunting for jobs and interviewing for jobs. And once you land the jobs, you’re working your hardest to be terrific assets to the businesses. 

You are preparing to graduate from high school, eager to take the athletic, academic, musical, and practical talents you’ve been developing in your youth and utilizing them in further life settings that lie ahead—college or otherwise.

As college students, you’re doing amazing things like student teaching, performing in talent shows and recitals, writing features for your university’s magazine, interning with Senators in the nation’s capital, and helping your team become the semester’s intramurals champs in soccer and water polo.

You are a writer, and your essay is now the interest of a famous author, whose book is about to be turned into a major mainstream motion picture.

You are authoring the second book of your own original trilogy.

You are making your Broadway dreams come true in the Big Apple.

You are about to be an opera soloist for the first time in your life, as part of Handel’s Messiah.

You are playwrights, animators, and filmmakers.

You are building superb websites with your computer programming and graphic design skills.

You are training to become physical therapists, pharmacists, doctors, and engineers.

You are lawyers and lawyers-in-embryo.

You are positively influential singers, songwriters, composers, dancers, athletes, photographers, and politicians.

You are supporting your choice presidential candidates, traveling to Colorado to help the campaigns roll along.

You are chefs.

You are nannies.

You are teachers.

You are accountants.

You are aiming for pilot’s licenses.

You are fashion and interior designers.

You design and build beautiful houses.

You compete in the Miss America Pageant.

You want to become veterinarians and veterans.

You are 5K runners, 10K runners, marathoners, half-marathoners, and decathletes.

You dedicate yourselves to protecting people, homes, and wildlife from forest fires.

You practice American Sign Language and aid those who are deaf or hard of hearing.

You practice English as your second language. You even just reached your goal of becoming an official U.S. citizen!

You try to make the world a better place by being the best missionaries you can be for your church.

You love your families, and you create happy, warm atmospheres in your homes.

You are excellent grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncles, and you give the best of your love to your little munchkins.

Some of you even had the same dream I did—we all ended up auditioning for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir (and we made it in, too—holla!)!

To all of you, thank you for sharing your talents and aspirations with me. The fact that you shoot for the moon and aspire to great things inspires me to do the same. I thank God every day that I have you. Keep shooting, keep aspiring, keep hoping. It’s inspirational. Truly.